Will The CAMRA Beer Bus Really Save The Rural Pub?

The 16-seater bus will take drinkers from Colchester town centre to pubs across the area from next month. The Real Ale Runabouts will give 26 watering holes that are not well served by public transport a much-needed boost. Colchester’s branch of the Campaign for Real Ale has compiled the series of monthly tours, with the first on May 12. The bus will stop for an hour at up to five pubs... “We are trying to get people out there, and if we can get 16 people out there a night, somebody might say this is a good place and get the word around.”

Paid for by a 500 pound subsidy and five pound tickets, it is not a hugely expensive experiment. Yet, the bus runs just once a month. What I don't understand is why these pubs, if there were enough of them, don't set up their own shuttle bus service if there was a real chance of the word getting around turning into real revenue? Not enough in it for them?

Maureen Ogle said this about the book: "... immensely readable, sometimes slightly surreal rumination on beer in general and craft beer in particular. Funny, witty, but most important: Smart. The beer geeks will likely get all cranky about it, but Alan and Max are the masters of cranky..."

Ron Pattinson said: "I'm in a rather odd situation. Because I appear in the book. A fictional version of me. It's a weird feeling."

Comments

We looked into a beer tour of Vancouver Island. We are hoping to do Longwood, Craig Street, Wolf and back to Victoria. Forty guys have expressed interest. Problem is a coach with a bathroom and driver for the whole day is going to cost north of a grand. It's a tough gig to arrange, especially when your potential participant pool are mostly drunks.

It is an interesting experiment and I think the publicity it gains is probably the best results for the scheme from the pubs' point of view.

What would be more interesting to know is what unsatisfied demand for public transport there is in an evening and if buses are laid on what difference to custom in the pubs this makes.

I'd also be interested to see if the Welland Valley beer festival in Northants and the Three Valleys Pub festival in Derbyshire (where a load of rural and suburban pubs put events on linked by a regular free bus service funded by the venues) happened more often than once a year what would happen.

Alan is apparently a Gen X-er who has hit 40... err...44... err... 45... YIKES... 46 ... [ZOW-WEE!!] 48... jessh, now 51... and edits and writes about other stuff at his personal website Gen X at 40. Please email Alan or any of the authors at this blog's gmail account - please write if you want to join the ranks of authors of this site or just want to send in a story on your favorite beer or photo of your regular pub.

I have moved the content of the OCB Commentary Wiki here. It is now a static document and pretty much is locked in as understandings existed as of 2012. Probably needs its own wiki to update the content! Below are the original introductory remarks:

"The purpose of this wiki is to collectively make comments, add annotation, identify errata and suggest further sources to the text of The Oxford Companion to Beer. Members are asked to avoid comment about the authors, the structure of the text or other extraneous matters. This wiki is a not for profit project that reviews the text pursuant to the concept of "fair dealing for the purpose of criticism or review" under Canadian copyright law." Alan McLeod, wiki Organizer, and chief bottle washer at A Good Beer Blog. Motto? "Many hands make pleasant work." Alan McLeod, 25 October 2011. Please provide some information about yourself when making a request to join the wiki. Anonymous requests for membership will not be approved. Overly ardent and rudely put claims to authority will be cause for removal from the membership. As of 11 January 2012, 134 entries or 12.2% of the total of 1,100 received commentary, many with multiple comments. Eight of the photos have been corrected as well. That number rose to 151 by 13 May 2012.